Someone You Can Stand
by Litfromjess
Summary: One boring Saturday leads Kat into a series of events that make her question everything she thought she wanted. K/P.
1. Chapter 1

The thing is sex always makes her think of placentas, well at least some of the time, and it kind of weirds her out. Not that she's about to have sex. Currently Kat is on top of her covers reading something for school which bores her, unsurprisingly, and every now and then her thoughts turn to sex. She's not sure whether that should surprise her or not.

Putting the book down, Kat pads downstairs and is pleased to see the front room empty. Her father seems to be out in the garden, and Bianca had some kind of social event she was at. If she cared, she could check her father's meticulous logs for the details of Bianca's whereabouts, but she has better things to do.

Or not. There's really nothing on tv, except some movie with Julia Stiles that's completely more Bianca's style than hers. Kat flips off the television and grabs her purse. She doesn't know where she's going, but she knows that the house will be boring, so she'll… find a coffee shop? Nah, too liberal trendy for her. A park? Too family-oriented.

She ends up in a music shop. It's not just a shop that sells CDs, though it has those. There are also various instruments, most prominently the guitars hanging on the wall. She goes over and picks up a Fender reverently, hands carefully gauging the weight. With the smooth feel of it in her fingers, she feels like she's stepped out of her body and into some other place where she owns a Fender, and she can maybe do that screaming chick music thing she fantasizes about when she needs to take herself mentally away from her boring day to day existence. And she grudgingly admits, very grudgingly, that if it weren't for Patrick, she might as well be a robot spitting out route test answers as she takes her sister to and from wherever she needs to go.

Though he doesn't bear thinking about. Not while a Fender is in her hands. Not even placentas and sex have their place here. This space is sacred. For a moment, she forgets that there is anything she'll ever have to trudge through, anything left to regret. She finds herself smiling.

Then she stops smiling. Like some kind of literary demonic antagonist, she notices Patrick enter the store as if beckoned by her merely thinking his name. Kat tries to ignore him, but the moment is completely ruined. "So you're stalking me now?" he asks with a raised eyebrow and a smirk.

Her frown deepens. "What do you mean? I was here first."

"Depends on how you look at it. I've been coming here for years." He lifts the Fender from her hands, and she grieves its loss. "You play?" he asks, and he has the audacity to put the strap around his shoulder.

She gaps, offended that he would even think he was worthy enough to handle _that _guitar like that. Mixed with that is a little envy. She closes her mouth, crosses her arms, then answers, "I want to. You?"

"I guess you could say that." He puts the guitar back where it belongs, moves over to the CDs. Kat follows, despite herself. She watches him skim through the titles, pausing at one before moving on again.

She looks at the CDs herself. There are things she wants, but she doesn't have much cash on her.

"Want to get out of here?" he asks.

"Excuse me?" she asks, looking over at him.

"Come on, we can go somewhere more interesting," he says, this time motioning towards the door with his head.

"What makes you think I would go anywhere with you?" Her hands are on her hips, and she's more intrigued and excited than she's been all morning, placenta sex thoughts aside.

"Fine, don't." He shrugs and turns towards the door. She runs to get in front of him and holds out a hand.

"At least give me time to think about it," she says. She has to push stray strands of hair back away from her face. "What kind of place is it?"

"It's a secret," he says, and she doesn't miss the mocking tone underneath his words.

"Secret is usually a euphemism for illegal," she tells him.

"And if it was?" She doesn't miss the challenge in that question. It runs up her spine and makes her feel less like a robot more like… well, more like an actual teenager, she supposes. Which is dangerous territory.

"Are drugs involved?" she asks.

He looks taken off guard by that. "No."

"Will I possibly be taken home in a police car?" she asks.

He's laughing at her under his breath. "It's not that interesting, I promise."

She lets out her breath before she gives in. "Alright. Let's go, but in my car. I'm not getting on your bike so we can be all pressed together and then I'll get my head busted open on the cement when you get distracted by the road."

"Have you always been this cynical?" he asks.

She meets his eyes. "You haven't seen anything yet," Kat swears as she turns back towards the door, he's still laughing under his breath at her.

---

"Paintball." It isn't a question, though her voice is very incredulous. "You're taking me to play paintball."

He's on his bike, having led her here because he was unwilling to leave it back at the shop. Patrick takes off his helmet, squinting as he looks at her because the sun is behind her back. "Why not?" he asks.

"It just seems so… normal." She gets out of the car and shuts the door. She's underwhelmed, sure, but there are guns, and there is Patrick, and those two things technically fulfill a fantasy she had about him once. Not the kind of fantasy that would inevitably lead her to thinking about placentas, mind you. The other kind, where she hurts people, and she thinks it is okay to have those fantasies, because she doesn't act on them… most of the time.

"You can go if you want. There are usually enough people around who want to play." He says it so matter of factly, like it doesn't matter if she's there or not. Kat crosses her arms.

"And give you the pleasure of maiming innocent people? I don't think so." She stomps off in front of him, knowing she's being dramatic. He's scoffing as he follows behind her. She's sure he wants to underestimate her because she's a girl. Luckily for her, those armed self-defense classes her father was willing to pay for are about to pay off.

For the record, she doesn't believe he's capable of maiming anyone. Patrick is, Kat's pretty sure, a sheep in wolf's clothing. Knowing this somehow doesn't detract from the bad boy appeal, because riding a motorcycle is still pretty edgy for high school, and she's willing to bet even though he's not violent, his personal life is chock-full of deviant behavior. He did recommend the fake ID, didn't he?

She wonders if he drinks alcohol while he goes to pay. She'd offered him the two dollars in change she found in her car, but he'd refused. Chivalry, as sweet as it can seem, is really just a chauvinistic way for males to say that they expect women to not be able to take care of themselves, like open a door for example, so they would are going to be kind enough to lend a hand. She supposes she should be flattered. She's not.

Not too long after that, Kat finds herself crawling on her stomach, gun in hand, through the leaves, behind a barrier. She keeps her ears open for the sound of footsteps, but all she hears is a woodpecker thumping at a nearby tree. After a quick glare at it, she continues until she can see around the edge. Nothing. He hasn't found her yet then.

She takes the opportunity to strategize. His flag is about fifteen yards away, though they are mostly open yards with little to shelter her. Like her, it seems he left his teammate as the guard and had gone after her flag himself. Unless he's lying in wait to eliminate her before going after the flag, which is a strategy she considers briefly before determining it to be too passive.

There's a tree, and if she gets in the branches and aims right, she could take out the guard, jump down, and be back behind the barrier before anyone has time to react. Kat crawls over to the tree, sliding up it on the side where she can't be seen. It's been awhile since she went tree climbing, but she eventually finds a good perch in the branches. Aiming is easy, firing easier than that.

The kid physically goes down when he's hit, like an actor on a stage, and before Kat knows it, paintballs are flying at her. She looks around to see where they were coming from, but she doesn't see anyone as she starts trying to scramble higher. "Damn it," she says, looking around the tree at the clearing. There's no one. It's coming from the trees.

Cursing under her breath again, Kat looks for a way down. If she can only get to the tree beside her, then she can make a quick exit back to the barrier. She experimentally wobbles the branch that she's planning on climbing out on. It seems steady enough. Kat slides carefully along it, careful to keep herself hidden in the branches. The paintballs have stopped, that seems to be a good sign.

She's midway out onto the branch when she hears his voice. "Nobody beats me at paintball." It is immediately followed by a hit to her leg, which takes her off guard. She winces as she looks up at the branch that used to be the spot where she was sitting.

Soon Patrick's face is over hers. "You alright?" he asks, offering a hand.

She pushes it away. "I'm fine, expect for the mild concussion I probably sustained." Kat glares at him. She knows logically he hadn't broken the rules of the game or done anything she wouldn't have done herself, but it just seems so petty. He could have at least waited until she was in a more secure position.

Pain sears across her skull. Explaining this to her dad's not going to be easy. As afraid as he is of her graduating with a baby in her arms, though arguably he's more afraid of Bianca doing it, he's also afraid of normal things, like car accidents and appendicitis and, more recently, the swine flu. "Just help me up," she tells him, holding out her hand, which he grabs with an exasperated expression.

She hands him her keys. "Here, you're going to have to drive my car home."

Patrick takes them, looking her over. "You're sure you're alright."

"Look, I plan on making an appointment with my PCP when I get home, but for right now, I'd like to get home, okay?" She says it slowly so that he'll understand, but more so that he'll take the hint and stop asking after her. It works on both accounts, and he seems frustrated as he turns and gathers her gun, heading towards the rental building. Kat unzips her suit, dismayed at the streak of yellow in her hair from an earlier game. She should have just read her book.

---

As they start on the way home, it's oddly quiet. "So what, are you like a paintball fanatic?" she asks him. "This isn't some morbid recreation of teenage murder fantasies, is it?"

There's that look. That look that tells her, _You've got to be kidding me, right?_ "My dad used to take me." He uses the same tone that she does when she didn't want to discuss something further, so she leaves it alone.

Kat turns around to face him. "Do you like snow cones?"

That look again. "I guess. Why?"

"I kind of want one. Mind if we stop?" Being annoying is only an added bonus. She means it about wanting one. It was kind of hot out in the woods they played paintball in, and she hasn't had a snow cone since a couple of summers ago.

He shrugs. "Why not?" She hates that he makes her feel like an annoying little sister or something. Her eyes narrow. Did he think of her that way? It makes an eerie kind of sense considering the way he treats her, not quite interested but not quite disinterested either. Was it… brotherly?

The thought disturbs her more than it should. Not that she's going to try to verify any of this. That would involve making sure his feelings were non-brotherly, and she isn't sure she wants to know. She just doesn't want to be patronized. She hates being patronized. Her "pater" is already a little overwhelming as it is.

She makes him get a gummy bear put in the middle of her cherry snow cone. He hands it to her with a disgusted, "here", and she takes it with just a smile. It feels sort of like she has the upperhand, and she likes it.

He doesn't get one himself, so she eats hers in silence. "You should drive with both hands on the wheel," she tells him when she notices his right hand is casually draped over the top of the steering wheel.

Patrick drapes his other hand through the bottom hole of the steering wheel. "I only have liability," she adds.

He glances over at her in a not too friendly but possibly brotherly way and sits up before putting both hands on the wheel. When she thinks about it, it does remind her of her relationship with Bianca, but it feels creepy, so she leaves off that train of thought. This only leads to her cherry snow cone making her think about placentas again, which isn't too pleasant. She's never going to let her dad make her watch that video again. Ever. She'll have to find it and burn it, along with the copies he probably has stashed away. Her father has thorough down to an art form.

They're at her house before she knows it, and it's only then she realizes he has no good way to get back to his bike. "Do you need money for the bus?" she asks.

"I'm fine," he says. They get out of the car and look at each other over the hood.

"Thank you, for… you know, everything," she says, trying to be casual. Kat's pretty sure she pulls it off.

"You're welcome," Patrick says, tossing her the keys. "Next time, though, we take the bike."

The thought of next time makes her feel tinglier than she wants to feel, so she pushes that feeling down as far as she can. "Let's see if there is a next time first," she says, turning to the house. She stops after a few steps. "And if there is, I pay."

He smiles at her, like he finds her amusing. It still might be brotherly, but this time she doesn't think so.

Her dad's in the kitchen drinking lemonade when she gets back inside. "Where have you been?" he demands.

"There was a study group at the library. I thought I told you?" She waits to see if he buys it, and she's not quite sure as indecision flickers over his face.

"Next time I want a twenty-four hour notice about study groups," he tells her. His eyes narrow. "Is that paint in your hair?"

"Yeah, part of the class project is some art thing we had to do," Kat starts up the stairs. "By the way, I tripped and hit my head pretty hard on one of the book shelves. Mind if I get it checked out?"

He goes into overly concerned mode. "Do you know what day it is? Who's the president?"

She rolls her eyes. "I need to go study." His protests follow her up the stairs, but he stays on the bottom step like usual. Inside her room the book is exactly where she'd placed it before she went out.

One hundred more pages to go. Her fingers slide over her yellow paint-covered hair, and she smiles despite herself.


	2. Chapter 2

She doesn't see him again until she passes him in the hall before class. Mandella watches their interaction with some dismay. "He's going to take you off guard," she whispers once Patrick is gone.

Kat, broken out of her thoughts, looks over. "What?"

"You know, he'll make you all complacent, and just when you believe he's not going to kill you…" She claps in front of Kat's face, making her jump. "BAM, he wraps barbed wire around your neck."

Kat's taken back. "I think you need to lay off the slasher movies. Seriously."

"It's your life," Mandella tells her, with a very serious expression. "You were a good friend." She wanders off to her class, leaving Kat staring after her.

The thing is, leaving out the barbed wire, what Mandella is saying isn't far from what Kat secretly thinks would happen if she were stupid enough to let herself get involved with Patrick. She'd feel safe at first, like he cared, and just when she wasn't expecting it, he'd show that he was exactly the same kind of moronic, sex-crazed adolescent male that she'd learned to avoid at her last high school, and he hadn't ever cared for her at all. Of course, since she was strongly aware of this possibility, she wouldn't get involved, or even want to get involved, and everything would go smoothly. Not that she cared. Not even remotely. Nor did she care if he cared. For all she cared, he could fall of the face of the planet.

They don't interact much that day, which deflates her mood for reasons she doesn't care to think about. It's alright because Bianca isn't in a much better mood. She gets into the car with her mascot head in her lap. "I might as well face it," she says. "I'm doomed to be some mediocre girl in high school who everyone thinks is sweet but no one remembers."

Kat turns to her. "Believe me, when you're meeting the jocks at your tenth year reunion, and they have all put on weight because they're still eating like an athlete even though they aren't anymore, and one of them spills beer on your dress, it won't matter anymore how important you were to them."

"It matters to me," Bianca protests. She puts a hand to her chest. "I'll carry with me the knowledge that I'm only so qualified to get by on my personality and good looks, because let's face it, Kat, I'm not going to be happy working through life, alright?"

Kat rolls her eyes. "Whatever." She starts the car before she notices his bike parked nearby.

"Can we go now?" Bianca asks, interrupting her staring, which is good, because he hasn't noticed yet. And he doesn't need to notice.

"Yeah, sure." She puts the car in gear, and Bianca sinks into the seat, still sulking about her horrible misfortunes.

---

When she gets out of her car the next day, he's waiting for her. "Remind me who was stalking who again," she says, grabbing her bag from the seat behind her.

"Maybe I'm just appreciating the view," he says with that smirk she hates so much. She turns around so that her butt is to the car.

"There are a lot of trees and squirrels," she agrees. "I'm sure the two brain cells you have left appreciate them very much."

It seems to amuse him even more that she's insulting him. Which leaves her without a solid strategy to use with him. "Excuse me, I need to get to class." She brushes past him, but he manages to grab her wrist.

He stuffs a piece of paper into her hand, and then turns around, still looking like the cat that ate the canary. Kat looks down at her hand. It's a flyer for some band that's playing in some place, perhaps a bar, she's never heard of. She moves to throw it away, but at the last minute, it gets crammed in her pocket.

Mandella stares at her with wide eyes when she tells her about it. "Don't let yourself be alone with him in the parking lot. I heard he has the ears of other women he's murdered hanging on his wall."

"Eww," Kat says, trying not to picture a string of ears. "I'm sure he has rock posters or whatever." She hopes it isn't half-naked models. Even though she's not interested in him. That's not the point. The point is, no one should have those posters. They should be banned. Outlawed.

"Do you want me to come as backup?" she asks. "I have some pepper spray my father bought me."

"I think our fathers just found something in common," Kat says, a little too enthusiastically. "I'll be fine. Patrick is… a bit like a small dog. He likes to bark, but stand up to him a little, and he backs down."

"You are so brave," Mandella says before sipping on her soda. She looks reverent as she watches Kat eat a sandwich. It weirds Kat out, just a little.

---

"Let me come at least," Bianca begs. "Going to a club to see a band is at least in the realm of cool, though couldn't you like John Mayer or something?"

"Could you be more of a sheep, Bianca, seriously?" Kat asks, annoyed. She wants to wear the black dress, but it says, "I wanted you to see me as sexy", and she doesn't want him to see her as sexy. He can see her as a fully formed human being with equally valid opinions.

"You look like a school marm in that," Bianca says, still pouting as she plops onto Kat's bed.

Kat looks at herself in the mirror. "It's not that bad."

"Uh, yes, it is." Bianca gets back to her feet and rustles through Kat's closet. "Here, look like a normal person for once."

"Normal is overrated," Kat mutters, but the outfit isn't too revealing or too dressed up, so she supposes she can bear to wear it. "Now out. Go hang up boy band posters in your room or something."

"That's so last decade," Bianca informs her, but she's moving towards the door, which is the important part.

Kat looks at herself in the mirror again. She brushes her hair once more. "I didn't spend too much time on this," she tells herself before grabbing her purse.

---

"Hold it a second, where are you going?" her dad says, and Kat wonders how he heard her because the TV is blaring and his back is to her.

Kat stops, and she has to pray to whatever god she isn't quite sure is out there that she pulls this off. Maybe she can owe him, no her, one. "There's a movie, about terrorism, and… Mandella is required to watch it for her post-WWII American History class, but she didn't want to go alone, because she's afraid of terrorists. It's like a phobia of hers." Which was all sort of true, if you counted Patrick as a terrorist and ignored the part about the movie and the class.

"It's only a phobia if it's unreasonable," her dad says, looking serious. "And being concerned for your safety is something both you and your sister could always use more of."

"I'm plenty concerned for my safety," she protests, mainly because if her father had his way, she'd become an agoraphobic spinster who wrote poems on chastity all day. Not Chastity. Eww, why had she even thought that?

"That's why you snuck into that place with that concert, where who knows what sort of people where they to sell you drugs, turn you into one of their crack whores." He stands up and looks at her. "Speaking of which, how do I know you aren't lying now?"

"I'll bring you back my ticket stub," she tells him, calmly, using her best poker face. By the time she's in college, she's going to be able to play with the best of them.

"I want a 200 word summary of the movie by tomorrow," he tells her, settling back down in front of the TV.

"Sure thing." She breathes a sigh of relief as she shuts the door. For a moment she rests there, wondering if this is a good idea, wondering if she's getting too involved here. Last time she had an excuse, she liked the band.

But maybe they just like the same music. Maybe she'll like these people, and if she doesn't, she can come home. It will have nothing to do with Patrick. Nothing at all.

---

There are movies where women, dressed in fancy dresses and with their hair extravagantly put up, walk into the club, furtively looking for the person they want out of all of the rest of the people in the smoke filled room. Kat, having just walked in the door, was determined not to be this woman, but she couldn't help her eyes from moving across the people. The déjà vu was strong enough. Hadn't she done this before? Of course. He'd almost kissed her then, hadn't he?

What was she doing now then? Kat honestly didn't know. Sighing, she found a decent place to sit and listen to the band. There were a few people who seemed to crowd the stage excitedly, like rats in a little cage. She let herself be bored, because boredom was better than anticipation.

The lights were dimmed a bit further as the band came onto the stage that had already been set up for them. Kat's eyes widened a bit in surprise as Patrick came out with them, an electric guitar that wasn't a Fender strapped onto his back.

Not knowing what else to do, she clapped hesitantly as the rest of the girls in the crowd cheered a bit more loudly than she liked. A guy approached the microphone, and he wasn't bad looking, Kat had to admit. "Glad to see you all came back," he told them, his voice combined with a slight whine from the microphone. "We have a guest with us tonight. This is my one of my good friends, Patrick, who's going to play for Neil while he's gone on vacation." A few girls made disappointed sounds at the mention of Neil. "I know, my brother's quite the ladies' man. Believe me, he's probably more than anxious to get back to you all." Upon saying this, he winked, then pulled his own guitar out. "Let's say we get this night started, shall we?"

The crowd cheered, and Kat had to admit they'd gathered a loyal fan base for being as small time as they seemed to be. The drummer started it off, and they started playing a song that sounded like Bon Jovi had met The Clash, which actually wasn't that unpleasant. For a moment near the end of the song, Kat thought Patrick noticed her watching, but if he had, the only indication he gave was perhaps the slightest of smiles. She sighed again, admitting at least that she was jealous. She could play half of Ironman by Black Sabbath, as embarrassing as that was, and even then, only on a good day. It wasn't hard to imagine her father saying, "Turn down that racket. Shouldn't you be using your time to do something productive, like studying?"

She sat through the rest of the songs, enjoying most of them but feeling a bit out of her element. While the encore was playing, she was tapping her fingers against the wood, still unsure if this was a good idea. Her eyes weren't even on the stage as they finished up, and half of the people were starting to pack up. At some table next to her, a girl seemed to be studying out of her microbiology textbook. It was going to be hard to avoid the drugs and sex at this joint.

"You must be Kat," she heard the voice that had spoken on the microphone say. She looked up to find him right in front of her with his hand held out.

She took it. "I guess I am."

"Well I'm Terrance, Terry for short." He pushed his hair back with one hand. "What'd you think of the band?"

"I was impressed, actually," she said, deciding to go ahead and give him her full attention.

He let go of her hand. "That's great. You know, you should come over for guitar lessons sometime. Neil's a great teacher, and he'd love you." Kat didn't really want to know what that meant.

"I'll consider it," she said, taking the piece of paper with the number. Great, another thing she'd have to keep track of, at least if she didn't want Neil to get a charming phone call from her dad about keeping his sperm to himself. Kat actually wondered if this guy could use that lecture.

"Alright, then, let me buy you a drink," he said, a bit rushed, and Kat found herself surprised yet again. And the night was still young.

"I don't drink, sorry, but if you really want, you could bring me some water." He was cute, what could she say?

Terry wasn't gone long before Patrick slid into the booth across from her. "You know, if you want to portray yourself as friendless, you don't invite people to the places where your friends play," she told him.

"I never said I didn't have friends. You assumed." He smiled, leaning back. "So what did you think?"

"I think you were showing off," she said, smiling herself. "Care to enlighten me as to why?"

"I figured if you were going to stalk me, you might as well have a better reason," he said, and at that moment Terry came back with the bottle of water.

She took it. "Play Mozart on the guitar for all I care," she told him. "Finally, someone with manners at the table," she added as she made room for Terry to sit down next to her.

Patrick leaned his head back against the seat like he could care less. "Don't be too hard on him," Terry said. "He's just like that."

"Just like what exactly?" Kat prompted, smiling despite herself.

Terry, gentleman he seemed to be, didn't take the bait, he just handed her another flyer. "We're playing out of town for a few weeks, but if you want to come and see the band again, we'd like to see you there."

"That'd be great," she said, taking the flyer and stuffing it in her purse. She took a final drink from the bottle. "Well I should be getting back. Great to meet you, Terry."

"Sure thing," he said, and Patrick gave her a small wave that was meant as much to show his disinterest as it was to say goodbye. She didn't even bother glaring at him as she headed for the door.

It wasn't until she'd taken a few steps down the sidewalk that she heard someone follow her out the door. Kat turned back to find Patrick standing less than a meter away. "I could show you a few things," he said, then added, "on the guitar."

"I'm sure you could," she said, "But so could Neil. He seems to be quite enthusiastic about teaching."

Patrick let out something akin to a snort but slightly more subtle. "Why'd you come tonight, Kat?"

The question took her by surprise. "I like music," she said defensively.

"Right." He bridged most of the gap between them.

"Why do you want so badly for people to think you're a friendless loner who might have corpses in his basement?" she asked, but he didn't seem surprised by the question.

He took a step closer, so she took a step back, but a small step, to show she wasn't about to be intimidated. His eyes were intense as he looked at her. "Maybe I don't want to know them, and that just makes it easier."

"Maybe you're scared to have people know you," she corrected.

"You don't know anything about me," he said, voice still calm.

"And you like it that way."

"Maybe I do." He was close enough that she could feel the slight warmth coming off his body, his breath, in the cooler night air.

Kat tensed despite herself, sure he was going to kiss her, unsure whether she wanted him too. Instead he put his mouth right next to her ear and whispered, "Admit it, you like it that way too."

The vibration from his voice sent shivers down her spine, and Kat was left feeling suddenly cold on the sidewalk as he disappeared back inside the building.

"What does he know?" she said finally, turning to make her way back to her car. She was tired of being analyzed by someone who had at most taken one high school course in psychology.

Next he'd tell her something like she was a turtle, and even though she couldn't actually picture those words coming out of his mouth, she was sure he thought them. And he thought them because she was a woman, and women must be vulnerable on the inside. Like turtles.

She was so lost in her thoughts that it wasn't until she got to her street that she remembered she hadn't bought the ticket. "Damn," she cursed, weighing her options. Unfortunately, at this time of night, she only had one.


	3. Chapter 3

"Well, I'm grounded until further notice." Kat takes a bite of an apple as she sits at lunch with Mandella. "It's not as bad as it could be. I just have to submit request to go out forty-eight hours ahead of time."

"You're dad's hardcore," Mandella says in way of sympathy. At least Kat supposes that's how it's meant. It comes out rather monotone.

Kat looks at the apple as she contemplates. "Not a word I'd have considered for my father before, but oddly appropriate."

Patrick is over napping in the sun like he thinks he's some kind of house cat. Stray cat, perhaps. Hadn't said a word to her since that night at the club. Typical.

She doesn't realize she's sighed until Mandella asks, "What's wrong? You seem rather distracted lately."

"I'm not distracted." Kat pulls a fry from Mandella's tray. "There's a lit exam next period. _As You Like It_."

"I've always liked things with cross-dressing chicks," Mandella says from out of nowhere.

Kat just raises an eyebrow. "Anyhow, then I have another night of _Dateline_ with dad or reading in my room again. Can someone just kill me now and put me out of my misery?"

"I bet he'd do it," Mandella says, nodding as she looks at Patrick.

"I doubt he has the balls," Kat says. "His biggest crime is probably stealing a CD from the local Wal-Mart. Scary stuff."

"I bet he stole a knife," Mandella adds, apparently missing the sarcasm in Kat's voice. "I bet his backyard is full of bodies."

Kat snorts. "I bet his sheets are gross."

"From seducing the women before he kills them," Mandella says, finally turning away from Patrick. "I get chills just thinking about it."

Kat looks at her friend, seriously hoping 'the chills' are not related to Patrick's… bed. She shakes herself, disturbed by this new turn in the conversation and her thoughts.

When she finally gets up to throw her apple core away, Patrick is nowhere around, which she counts as a good thing, even if it's boring. Like _Dateline_. Boring. Kat sighs.

This isn't going to work. Basing all her hopes for entertainment on an antisocial loser like Patrick? _Please_. She's so much better than that.

Kat makes her way back to Mandella. "I'm breaking out tonight."

Mandella looks properly impressed. "What are you going to do? Can I come?"

Kat tries not to be deflated at the question. "Do…?" She paused looking around, and then she realized Bianca had said something about a party tonight. "How do you feel about crashing a party?"

"What exactly did you have in mind?" Mandella asks, and Kat motions for her to stand, holds out an arm for her.

"Walk with me. I'll tell you exactly what I have in mind."

---

Kat puts the final lump in the form under her covers that is supposedly her. "Bianca's not the only one who knows how to sneak out," she says with not just a little pride.

She used to sneak out a lot. Just that thought brings with it the weight of times Kat doesn't want to think about.

Shaking herself out of it, she pulls her window open, looking down towards the ground. It was easier before they moved. There'd be trees and even a lattice, which her father, on one of his really bad days had gotten paranoid about and taken down. She guesses he'd had a point. She had used it that way. Kat grabs her backpack.

Her feet hit the ground with a solid thud, and she has to bite back the word that comes to her mind as the impact travels up her legs. Her hands sting from sliding against the ground too hard. Definitely not used to that anymore.

Mandella meets her on the street with her car. "It's actually my brother's car," she explains as Kat gets in. Kat supposes that explains why it looks like a normal teenage girl's car. Well, sort of.

"Okay, I googled the directions." She smiles over at Mandella. "Ready?"

"Sure thing," Mandella agrees, and Kat has to admit conspiratorial smiles really are the best kind of all.

---

It's at Joey Donner's house, something she knew because his parents were out of town. Sadly she also knew this because Bianca had thought it was at someone else's house until one of the cheerleaders had taken pity on her and told her the truth on the low-down. She should feel guilty that this will hurt Bianca's chances of going to another party, but she doesn't. That's considering Bianca makes it, considering she didn't have permission either.

It sort of makes her proud, to think that her sister is sneaking out. She just wishes it were for some reason that was more important. Heck, if she wanted to join PETA and spray paint fur coats, it'd show more personality than wanting to go to this party.

Putting all thoughts of her sister aside, Kat watches as they pull up to the house. It's definitely a party, she can see the people parking around the street and flowing into the house like ants. Come to think of it, that metaphor works in more than one ways. Hive mind… high school students…

"Are we going to go?" Mandella asks as she turns the engine off and pulls out the keys.

Kat snaps out of her thoughts and smiles. "After you," she says, enjoying the slight trickle of adrenaline already making its way into her blood stream as her heart beat just a tiny bit faster. The human body really was an amazing thing.

They make their way up the sidewalk towards the party, ignoring the people who have already noticed them there. Chastity is already making her way towards the door when they get there. "What do you think you're doing?" she asks, head tilted to the side, hands on hips, and her expression that says, _Oh no you didn't_.

Kat tries to give her a look that says, _Oh yes I did_. "Well after watching people act like complete idiots to get invited to one of these, I wanted to see exactly what the fuss was about."

Mandella just nods from halfway behind Kat. "I think you should go home," Chastity tells her.

Kat holds up the one thing she took from the car, her magic weapon for pulling this off. "But I bought beer."

A few people near the door happily take it from her, and it's spread out faster than Kat though possible. Chastity looks disgusted. "This isn't worth my time," she says, turning around and disappearing back into the crowd.

Kat loves how predictable people are.

Inside they make their way through the people pressed way too close together. "So what do we do now?" Mandella asked her in a hushed whisper.

"We just have to wait for a bit," Kat told her. "Go enjoy yourself if you want."

Mandella looks at her dubiously, but she wanders off. Kat wonders if bringing her was a good idea, but she looks at her watch. It's less than half an hour of this stuff to get through. It shouldn't be hard.

She's trying to find a decent place devoid of people necking, looking like they'll be puking up their guts in the morning. How charming. "Kat, is that you?" someone asks from her right.

Kat turns to see Terry making his way over to her. "Terry, right?" she asks as he gets close enough to stop and smile at her.

"Yeah. I didn't know you were into the whole party scene," he says.

"I didn't know you were into the whole lame high school party thing," she says back.

He actually looks embarrassed. "I, actually, there's this girl I'm interested in, and I was hoping if I wanted it really badly, I'd find her here."

"Like that Smiths' song," she says.

"Well, anyways, mind keeping me company?" he asks, offering her his arm.

Kat ignores how she feels about being on someone's arm and takes it anyway. "I'm afraid I'm here as a bit of a crasher."

He seems to understand, and he doesn't look a bit surprised. "Patrick should be around here somewhere. I kind of begged him to come, though I wouldn't be surprised if he just headed home instead."

"His loss," Kat tells him, smiling despite herself. There's an easy going air to Terry that makes it nice to be around him. She checks her watch again. "I think I'm going out to the lawn. Want to come?"

He shakes his head. "I have to get on the road tomorrow, so I should probably be going. Though I realized I hadn't given you my number," he looks up at her from the paper he's writing on. "You know, in case you ever decide you want to see us practice or something."

It dawns on Kat that he likes her as she takes the little piece of paper. She just gapes at the paper as he leaves, not quite sure what, if anything, she wants to do about it. Besides, hadn't he been trying to set her up with Neil? Patrick's friends were turning out to be as confusing and frustrating as Patrick himself was.

Kat's almost to the door when there's a sudden surge of noise from the crowd around her and a huge group of new people make their way in the door. She smiles until she's smashed against the wall by everyone making room for the people who are shoving their way inside. Craigslist can do a lot really fast. Isn't the internet great?

Praying for her internal organs as she makes her way along the wall, Kat finally squeezes through the crowd and out into the night air. She holds her hands away from herself, trying not to think of all the sweat that was likely to have soaked into her clothes by now. Gross.

Her eyes widen as the first police car pulls into the driveway, red and blue lights flashing. Someone grabs her hand and starts pulling, but she's too fixated on the police car to pay much attention. Finally she tries to pull her hand back as she looks to see who's half-dragging her away from Joey's front yard. "Patrick?" she asks, disbelieving.

He just smiles at her like she's a child, something Kat wonders when she'll get used to, and continues pulling her along. "I parked my bike on the next street over," he explains.

Kat's grateful enough to get away from the police cars, she accepts this plan of action for the moment. "Wait, but Mandella…"

"There's no time," he tells her. "Look, she'll be fine."

"Then why won't we be fine?" she demands, struggling to pull them both to a stop.

He sighs. "Because you brought alcohol, which would be illegal, seeing as most of the people in there were minors."

Kat admits Chastity would rat on her given half a chance. She didn't see Bianca at the party, so she hopes suddenly she stayed at home. She looks over at Patrick, something he'd said catching her attention. "What about you?"

"Are you always this difficult when someone's trying to help you out?" he asks, letting her hand go in disgust. He keeps on the way they were going.

Kat follows him. She starts to say something, but he's right. "Well thank you," she says, and it does sound a little sullen, but he can take it or leave it. She's not going to say it again.

He just shakes his head, but he does seem to slow down a little for her.

By the time they reach his bike, she can see that a grand total of two police cars are at the party, but it occurs to her that only a few of them would be in any kind of real trouble. It's disappointing when she considers what usually happens in the movies. She'd do something nice for Mandella to make up for this.

When she looks away from the house, Patrick is already on his bike, helmet on, getting ready to start it up. "Do I get a helmet?" she asks.

"Does it look like I have one?" he asks.

"Well then give me yours." She doesn't find this demand unreasonable. Driving the thing in the first place says that he's already resigned himself to the higher mortality rate. She hasn't. She wants to live, thank you very much.

He makes a frustrated sound, but he does hand her the helmet. "You really expect a lot for someone going out of their way to help you."

"I think we've been over this," she says, swinging herself onto the seat behind him. She has ridden a motorcycle before, but that seems like forever ago. The sound of the engine cuts through her nostalgia. Kat puts her arms tightly around him. "Don't think this means anything," she warns him.

"Trust me. I won't." His hair waves around in the wind as they glide down the road, and Kat likes noticing this because he seems to have a thing about looking composed. A very small part of her wants to touch it, but she figures it is something about movies and aesthetics. In other words, values programmed into her by the media elite are causing her to want to touch his hair right now, so it's alright because it's not really her, it's her brainwashing. And she's resisted it, thus she's won.

This thought leaves Kat feeling vaguely satisfied with herself. She has to admit the wind against her bare arms feels nice, if not a little too cold. The cold though makes the warmth of Patrick's body more comfortable, and damn it, she didn't just think that.

Kat tells him to stop just short of the house, and she knows that even though the porch light isn't on, her father might still be waiting for her. She's shivering from the ride in the cool night air, and Patrick notices. "I'll be fine," Kat tells him, taking off the helmet. She's not going to take his jacket or something. This isn't some horrible romantic comedy. She has more self-respect than the women in those movies.

Kat smiles, though, because it was kind of fun, and she feels satisfied somehow with the evening. They look at each other for one long awkward moment, where she's remembering the heat of his body, and who knows what he's thinking.

"Maybe you could teach me, to, you know, play the guitar," she suggests, though she can't figure out for the life of her what compelled her to say it.

"Sure," he says. With that he gets back on the bike, and she remembers she still has his helmet in her hands. She hands it to him, and he takes it with a quick, "Thanks."

"Right." Kat waves at him. "Thanks for the ride home."

"Anytime." He still looks more amused with her than anything, and Kat tries not to resent that. The evening's been too enjoyable. Even if she'll have to make it up to Mandella.

No one stops her on the way back to her room, but she won't know if she got away with sneaking out until the morning. For the moment, she's exhausted, but it takes her awhile to quiet her thoughts down enough to sleep.


End file.
